Sword Dancer: Mystic Eyes
by Unlimited Blade Works
Summary: Time stops for no man and plots hundreds of years in the making begin to unfold. The game that the Magician Kischur Zelretch Schweinorg started when he implanted Harry with the Magic Circuits of another man has only just begun. The Game has reached its second phase, one far more intricate and deadly than the first. There can only be one winner, and this time it may not be Harry.
1. Chapter 1

**Sword Dancer: Mystic Eyes**

**Chapter One: The Black Princess**

**Author's note-**

Hello one, hello all, welcome to the next book of the Sword Dancer Series, Sword Dancer: Mystic Eyes. Now I have been asked a few times what the pairing is in this series and so far I answered that I don't know yet, well we're going to start resolving that now but first there's something that needs to be worked out.

Should Harry be with only one person, with two people, hell with a harem? Now to be perfectly honest with you there is in real life very little hope that one person could ever actually have a harem or even a relationship that involved more than two people and that actually worked. You know where every girl knows about the other and is fine with it or that the man knows about the other men and is fine with it, but that being said sometimes in fiction multi partner relationships are actually done quite well. I direct your attention to the relationship that Rand Al'Thor is in, in the Wheel of Time series. That is an example of a multi partner relationship that actually seems plausible.

Moving on, with that being said a poll will be placed up on my profile which will have the choice of a single person relationship or a harem. After three weeks this poll will be taken down, should the harem option be chosen another poll will then be put up to answer the question of how many women, note that the number will not exceed 4. I grant you that I said above that a multi partner relationship is sometimes done quite well in fiction, that being said let's not go stupid with it. No man, I don't care who,(Shadow Clones do not count) could realistically handle being in a relationship with more than four women, there simply wouldn't be enough time in a week to give every woman the attention that she deserves. Hell to be honest 4 would be pushing what one man could handle but I do think that its possible.

A big thank you to Zimbolical for the BETA job.

So there you have it my dear readers, the fate of Harry's love life is now in your hands. Please do vote and review and I do hope that you enjoy Sword Dancer: Mystic Eyes.

**Story Start-**

"Shit," The obscenity was the first word to escape Harry's mouth in the last three hours that was not directly related to his Magecraft. A single look at the boy would tell one that the twelve year old was in need of medical attention. The cut on his face, running from under his left eye and finishing under his right, was almost constantly bleeding. His left arm dangled uselessly at his side, dislocated from a fall only minutes prior. His right arm was clutching his ribs, three cracked, two broken. His right leg was a mess of cuts and bleeding, courtesy of his bright idea of setting off an explosive rune combination to escape his hunter.

The twelve year old looked to the sky, dammit it was almost sun down, he needed to leave and fast. Harry gripped his left shoulder with his right hand and pushed, groaning as the dislocated appendage was popped back into place. He checked his weapons again, he already knew what he would find but Harry was hoping he may have missed something. Pistols, gone, grenades, gone, C4, gone, throwing knifes, gone, Belphegor, broken, healing runes, used, radio, destroyed, translocation gem, destroyed, Harry sighed. This couldn't get much worse. An explosion sounded from the center of the town, or maybe it could.

"Shit," The black haired Enforcer in training cursed again as yet another block went up in flames. Just as the sun finally set beyond the horizon, Harry started running. They'd already started a bombing run that meant everyone was already out or dead and considering the circumstances, Harry was betting on dead. Standard Enforcer protocol when dealing with a Dead Apostle of any rank. First a team is sent to the affected area to block it off, after which a second team is inserted to take care of the problem, if for any reason the second team failed and reinforcements couldn't get to the affected location fast enough the first team was to destroy the entire area.

The sun had just set too, if he was right and he really was the last Enforcer left inside the town then the abomination would be hunting him. Or it could be fleeing, Harry made the assumption it was hunting, it would be less of an unpleasant surprise that way if he ran into the cursed thing, well it would still be unpleasant but at least it wouldn't be a surprise. Either way he needed to get out of this town, he had no radio to call for a pick-up and the chances of finding either one of the teams radio's or a working phone was slim to none, looked like he would be going on foot. He could risk an air pick-up from the chopper they had back at the HQ but a car would be too slow.

Harry kicked off the ground and ran down a side ally, another explosion ripped through the early night air behind him. Then he heard it groaning and shuffling, The Dead, it seemed, had found him. They came from the mouth of the ally, all five of them, Harry whipped his hands forward, the two strings of Blutige Draht shot forward, wrapping around two neck. Harry pulled on the wires and the heads feel free from the decaying body. His hands twisted and the wires moved again, decapitating another two, Harry jumped over the last Dead and landed lightly in a crouch behind the abomination. His hands jerked, the final head fell, Harry was up and running before it hit the ground.

The black haired Enforcer flew out of the ally way and back out onto one of the back roads of the small French town. Harry didn't slow his reckless run in the slightest as he pelted down the street, he heard yet another explosion behind him. They were getting closer and he wasn't ready to die just yet. He stopped, gulping down the air like it was water the kind of physical exertion he had been going through, even while reinforced, was taking its toll on him. Especially when he had been reinforced for the better part of fourteen hours.

Harry pressed himself to the side of a building, he could hear it again the shuffling, this time in force. The Enforcer in training calmed himself. First thing was first, how many where there? Harry closed his eyes and focused intently on his hearing, he couldn't make out the exact number but it was definitely in excess of twenty. Sure he could fight that many, he would win too, but that would also be keeping him in one place for far too long for his liking.

Harry looked up at the building, a classic two story home, the Enforcer kicked off the ground in a jump and grabbed the windowsill on the second floor, Harry's arms strained and he pulled himself up at the same time as kicking off the building forcing him onto the roof. The Enforcer in training allowed himself a moments rest, he knew he needed it. Before standing again, Harry looked out over the town, it was a tiny place, small, out of the way, a little spit of land that you'd probably not even be able to find on a map.

When he and the other nine had entered the town at dawn, 0542, that morning it had been picturesque. A quiet country village in the middle of nowhere with an old church at its center. It was a fine place as far as scenery went, peaceful even. What one would not suspect was that the peace was that of the grave.

Harry looked over the town now and compared it to the one inside his mind. The town was on fire, half the buildings were rubble, the dead littered the streets, some moving the others not, hell, this place truly was hell.

He shook his moment of slight nostalgia off and refocused. He needed to make it out of the town. Harry angled for the warehouses he could see on the far side and started to roof hop. He only hoped that he didn't get blown up on the way.

**XXX**

Harry landed lightly inside the warehouse. He'd had to abandon the rooftops about an hour ago since he had seen the Dead Apostle using them as well. Harry just hoped he had been able to escape the abomination's notice. One thing that he had noticed about the figure, however was that it had both arms, Harry had cursed at that. The black haired Enforcer in training had met the Dead Apostle once before that day. It was how Belphegor had previously been destroyed, Harry had deliberately overloaded the runic blade to blow off the damn things right arm. It seemed that the Apostle had been able to recover and reattach the limb, damned abomination.

His only weapons left were Blutige Draht and Ureil. He really did not need another encounter with the damned thing. Now that he thought about it, that last encounter had cost him his radio, translocation gem and his pistols. Harry took a few deep breaths and got ready to run again. Glass above him shattered and Harry dove away, forward rolling on the ground and coming up into a crouch, as a figure cloaked in black fell from the sky.

Harry's mouth went dry, oh goddammit no, ROOT BE DAMNED, WHY THE FUCK DID THIS HAVE TO HAPPEN!? The figure rose from the crouch he had landed in, red eyes glittering in the darkness. The figure was dressed immaculately, a fine Italian suit and a cloak like a lord of old would have worn. A well maintained brown beard upon his chin, high cheek bones and cropped short hair, the figure smiled, fangs could be seen inside its mouth, Harry cursed again.

In front of him stood Hans Gunsche, minor lord of a small German Magi family, holding the family's Thaumaturgical Crest that dealt with heat manipulation. He had thirty three magic circuits of his own and another twenty seven in the crest, Harry gulped again, this was the Dead Apostle that he and the other nine had been sent to kill.

"Guten abend," The Dead Apostle greeted in his native German. Good evening, Harry didn't respond and instead drew his blade, Uriel, a snarl forming on his face as he prepared for a battle that he knew he wasn't going to win. The Dead Apostle walked forward and smiled.

"Now, now, no need to be so hostile. I promise that if you just let me kill you it will be painl-" Hans didn't get to finish his sentence as Harry chose that moment to strike. His hand flicked forward, the wires of Blutige Draht flew at his enemy. A normal human wouldn't have been able to see the wires, hell a human using reinforcement Magecraft could barely see them. The Dead Apostle however could, Hans jumped over the attack and found himself face to face with an Enforcer bringing his blade to bare.

Uriel swept up, down, left and right in short order. The Dead Apostle danced around the strikes smiling to himself, the Dead Apostle's claw flashed, Harry felt a burning pain in his chest but ignored it. The attack had hit him he knew that much but if it didn't stop him moving or kill him outright then it wasn't worth noticing right now. Harry's left arm flashed out in a punch, an attempt to hit the Dead Apostle in the face and put him on the back foot.

The vampiric creature caught the offending limb quickly and twisted, bone snapped and Harry found his forearm distorted by a bone sticking out of his skin distorting and ripping the red holy shroud he had wrapped it with. The black haired Enforcer in training couldn't help but smile, he dropped Uriel as the Dead Apostle caught his left arm. The wire of his Blutige Draht was already coiled around its right leg.

Harry already knew he was going to lose this fight, he was going to die here, either from the Dead Apostle or the bombing runs. The only thing he could do now was take his opponent down with him. Harry would be the first to admit he had gotten lucky with the wire, if Hans had taken him seriously from the get go and used his Magecraft Harry would already be dead. Fortunately the Dead Apostle had only seen an exhausted eleven going on twelve year old and not the threat he should have when facing an Enforcer, even one in training.

Harry yanked his right arm back at the same time Hans broke his left, the wire snapped taunt and the Dead Apostle screamed. Harry could hear it even as the abomination threw him away. The sound of the Apostles bones being cut, his muscles being shredded, his blood being spilled and finally the sound of Hans Gunsche's right leg being cut into seven different pieces. Harry hit the ground, hard, he could feel the blood pooling in his mouth, he had a concussion and Uriel was at the other end of the warehouse where he had thrown it. The Dead Apostle was dragging itself closer to him, Harry closed his eyes. So this was how he was going to die was it?

His circuits were already used up he couldn't push any more Prana through them if he tried. His body was beginning to shut down, his lungs were slowing as he simply gave up the fight for his life his heart slowing, this was how he was going to die.

Oh well not like he really minded, he was just a corpse after all, his heart still beat, his brain still worked but he was a corpse none the less. Harry opened his eyes again, he was accepting of his death. The one legged Dead Apostle was next to him propped up on one arm the other descending to rip his throat out. Harry closed his eyes again a small smile on his face, sure he was going to die but at least he was going to take this bastard with him, the bombs were getting closer he doubted that Hans would have time to restore the leg and run, no they were both going to die here.

The pain he had been expecting didn't come, Harry opened his eyes. Right in front of his throat the blow had been stopped, a single delicate hand holding the strike in a grip of steel. It was the hand of a woman, her fingernails painted red, skin a creamy white that belonged on no human, Harry's eyes travailed up her arm.

A long black dress that complemented her form and hair of the same colour that almost reached the floor beneath her. Her crimson eyes regarded both Hans and he as if they were beings so far beneath her as to not even be worth her time, she regarded him silently. The clouds outside parted, revealing a moonless night that served to have the stars illuminate her hair. Harry knew what this creature was, he already knew, he should be dead, she should have killed him and drained him dry by now. Or one of her bodyguards should have done it, so why? Why was he still alive. The cold crimson eyes regarded him.

"Zelretch was right you are interesting, for a human." The creature admitted almost silently. Her voice sounded like clear water running, like bells ringing. "For being such good entertainment for me I will allow you passage to leave this place but remember one thing mortal." The creature told him, she smiled sadistically, her fangs pronounced against the other teeth. "If you ever cross my path again and do not offer such fine entertainment then," her other hand gripped his face and forced him to look into her eyes. "I have no problem with erasing you completely." She sighed, the creature managed to make even that seem to be beautiful.

Perhaps he should be scared, terrified even, but he wasn't. He was...in awe. It was at that time amongst a small town that had been turned into The Dead and was Burning while she held another of her own kind from drinking his blood. It was a sight that Harry was quite sure he would remember even long after he had died and gone to hell.

That was how the Magus of Swords and the Black Princess of The Dead Apostles met for the first time.

**One Week Earlier**

Harry stood before his surrogate mother figure, someone he hadn't seen only heard from in the last nine months and three weeks, his suit was immaculate, Italian, naturally. Polished shoes and a pair of fingerless gloves on his hands. No other weapons were on him, not that it mattered, anyone who knew of Harry's ability knew that unless he was completely exhausted then he could always have a weapon in his hand faster than you could blink.

In the small space between the cuff of his shirt and the fingerless glove on his left arm a small patch of red could be seen. A holy shroud that Nicolas had gifted to him for protecting the fake stone. Harry wore it like a bandage around his left arm, the Shroud of Martin. It stopped external spiritual interference from affecting its wearer, Nicolas had also told him that spells such as Notice-me-not charms, disillusionment spells and invisibility cloaks were types of external spiritual interference so it had become difficult if not impossible to hide from the Enforcer in trainings eyes. Harry suspected that it would also help stop Legilimency as Nic had told him that the Shroud had some other abilities as well, then promptly kicked him out and told him to figure the rest out on his own.

Nic had been very grateful to Harry for protecting the stone and for confirming Voldemort was still alive and after it. The ancient Alchemist had really upped his protections around it after finding that out. Pern had been more than willing to teach him archery in exchange for letting her get her 'I told you so' in. He wasn't that bad at it either, Pern would slap him over the back of the head if she ever overheard him calling himself only 'not that bad'. The woman was convinced he was some kind of prodigy in archery, then again hitting the bulls eye every time from your first shot would do that to a person.

The wife of the old Alchemist had also been nice enough to throw in a beginner's book on Alchemy for the young Enforcer in training. She knew he would pursue battle Alchemy but said she would provide more information on it once she felt he had the basics down well enough. This made sense, especially when one took into account the fact that Perenelle Flamel was the best Battle Alchemist in the world. Granted Nic did out strip her over all in terms of pure Alchemic knowledge and power but in a fight Perenelle would win nine times out of ten.

However every gift that Nicolas and Perenelle had given him paled into utter insignificance when compared with their final gift. Honestly when he saw it Harry couldn't believe it, it was beautiful, it was terrible, it was...perfect. The most powerful blade in his armory, the pinnacle of every weapon he had ever seen and unlike Durandal, it seemed to be made for him, even then Harry could feel the sword calling to him, singing to him, wanting him to create it to hold it to wield it in battle for him to just be there for it. The sword that constantly sang to him, giving him a wish to hold it again, Arondight: The Unfading Light of the Lake. Harry felt giddy just thinking about the blade.

"So that's your mission report then?" Lorelei asked him, Harry nodded and the Vice Director of the Clock Tower looked over his report again.

"Yes my Lady." Harry informed the Vice Director who looked at the report again.

"Hmm, so Nicolas was right and someone was trying to steal his stone." Lorelei mused, then again it wasn't exactly rare that people wanted to do that. What was rare was someone actually getting close enough to do so.

"Harry," Lorelei snapped at her ward, who immediately stood straighter.

"Yes my Lady?" Harry asked in return, his eyes focused on the woman before him.

"Does Nicolas have any suspicions on how this Voldemort managed to cheat death?" Lorelei inquired, if he did the old Alchemist would likely have already told her but it never hurt to check other sources.

"He only said that he had theories nothing more, Nic did however ask me to report to him anything I uncover about the man calling himself Voldemort so that these theories can be confirmed." Harry replied to which Lorelei nodded slowly.

"Very well, good work Harry." Lorelei told him smiling, Harry's core warmed and the Enforcer in training felt giddy. "Now then," Lorelei continued all business. "There's going to be another job for you when you get back to that school." Harry nodded as Lorelei always did refuse to call it Hogwarts when she could, since she hated the stupid name after all. Not that Harry blamed her, it was a stupid name after all.

"What do you wish of me my Lady?," Harry inquired as respectfully as possible.

"As you know some of the things you have reported on have piqued a lot of interest inside the tower." Lorelei started, Harry nodded, the fact that Transfigeration was capable of complex molecular reconstruction in a small time frame had some of the Magi salivating at the very thought of the art. Lorelei took a deep breath, Harry froze, he knew that cue that was when she was about to tell him something she was sure he wasn't going to like but was going to order him to do anyway.

"Your school has agreed to lend us some of their teachers to do lecture once a week at the Tower." Lorelei began, Harry nodded not quite sure where she was going with this. "In exchange however we had to offer them something." Lorelei continued, Harry chose to interject here. Not many people would ever choose to interrupt Lorelei Barthomeloi but growing up with her had afforded Harry some leeway that most others simply didn't have.

"My Lady," Harry started causing Lorelei to stop and look at him sharply. "Permission to speak." He asked, Lorelei nodded, Harry breathed an internal sigh of relief.

"Why should we give something in return, in fact why do we even need the teachers here at all?" Harry asked, his question needed to be straight and to the point or else she may just dismiss it all together. "Surely it would be easier just to buy the books from the Wizards and then use that information? I know for a fact that all the books from first to seventh year seem to be quite readily available." Harry asked, Lorelei nodded, that was good it seemed that she believed that was a fair question.

"A good question and in answer to it yes we could simply use the books. However they only extends so far, tell me Harry what do you know of the Le Fay Institute?" Lorelei inquired, Harry shook his head.

"Nothing at all, my Lady." The black haired Enforcer in training answered back to his surrogate mother figure. Lorelei nodded in acceptance as if his ignorance was to be expected.

"Then allow me to enlighten you," Lorelei replied. "The Le Fay Institute as it is called these days is a magical school for the so called 'Wizards'. However when I say magical school I am only half way correct, the Le Fey institute is closer to a magical university. Think of your schools education as primary school through high school, if we were to continue in this vein then the Le Fay Institute would be a university." Lorelei took a deep breath before continuing.

"The institute also has very high entrance requirements. Out of the Wizards that pass the NEWT exams only the top ten percent are given invitations to the Le Fay Institute and even then out of the top ten percent only around thirty are actually given a place." Harry nodded but looked slightly confused. "Yes Harry?," Lorelei asked somewhat kindly.

"Just a question my Lady but what schools are recruited from besides Hogwarts?" The black haired Enforcer in training asked.

"To be honest the Clock Tower has at five privet Wizarding schools such as Hogwarts on record in the UK. There are also around ten to twenty public schools. All of the schools do work on a boarding system, however the privet schools, such as Hogwarts, have smaller class sizes and better teachers. The Le Fay Institute does not discriminate, they open their doors to any and all that are in the top ten percent. Does that answer your question Harry?" Lorelei asked, the black haired Enforcer in training nodded.

"Moving on, the Institute is the only Magical University in the UK, the French have their own that recruits from only the French population as do the Germans so on and so forth. Wrapping things up and to make my point we want your teachers because we know for a fact that at least two of them graduated from the Le Fay Institute with honors', it helps that they also teach the two subjects that most of the Tower is interested in." Lorelei finished her impromptu lesson with a small smile.

"May I ask who graduated from the Institute my Lady?" Harry inquired respectfully, Lorelei nodded.

"To the best of the Clock Towers knowledge both Minerva McGonagall and Filius Flitwick graduated from Le Fay while Professor Severus Snape was offered a place but chose to withdraw due to the ongoing Wizarding war at the time." Lorelei finished looking at Harry, "Now I need to tell you what I need you to do this year." Harry nodded as he knew that he wasn't going to like this.

"To put things bluntly I want you to take apprentices from the students of your school, all of the houses must be represented you are to have no more than ten apprentices but no less than five. Teaching some of the students Magecraft was the price that Albus Dumbledore asked for in exchange for lending us some of the staff he has in his employ." Lorelei finished, Harry's face went blank. His mind ticking over slowly, apprentices, he could deal with that, now to find out what Lorelei thought Dumbledore wanted with the apprentices he had to take and, perhaps even more importantly, what Lorelei wanted with them.

"My Lady," Harry interjected, this was a question he felt that he needed to ask. "May I ask why Dumbledore made such an odd request as simply having me take on a few apprentices? Surely he could have asked for more such as books on Magecraft or even experimental results or help in research. Surely he must know that I will use a geas to make sure they can not teach Magecraft to others and that we will need personal quarters for all of these so called apprentices, the old man is really willing to part with all this just for ten or, more likely, less students to know Magecraft?" The Clock Towers Vice Director nodded acknowledging the validity of the question.

"While we don't know exactly what he wants I do have a guess." Lorelei told her ward who nodded, he had expected as much. "This Voldemort character is obviously still alive in one form or another and you and I both know how simple it is to reconstruct a body. My guess is that the dear Headmaster wants powerful soldiers in case this Voldemort person ever manages to get a body back and attack them again, and who better to train fine soldiers than the Magi who are known for the ruthless efficiency of their Enforcers. As for the geas and the living quarters he has agreed to those terms as well, he did however agree to the geas under the provision that the student voluntarily agreed to it and were not tricked into signing. That being said you do reserve the right to not take a student should they refuse to take the geas." Harry nodded at his mother figures words as Lorelei smiled again.

"As you may have already come to the conclusion of there is something I want from your apprentices." Lorelei told him Harry nodded, that much had been obvious. "To put things simply I want them loyal to the Clock Tower before the Wizards, take a mixture, the so called Muggle-borns, the Pure-bloods, the Half-bloods make sure they are all represented. More so to the point make sure they can be molded to our designs. I don't care if they want to live in the Wizarding world or not all I care about is if the Clock Tower wants something and the Wizards want something they will side with us, I have some plans that will need their help to execute, tell me Harry can you do that?" Lorelei asked him, Harry nodded slowly, it would take time but that should be possible.

"Also as I am sure you know during the reign of terror that this Voldemort character had over the Wizards Dumbledore fought for his so called 'Greater Good'. No doubt he will try to infect your apprentices with the same philosophy, break them of it." Lorelei told him, Harry just nodded in return. His Lady's orders might as well be holy gospel as far as he was concerned, her will would be done.

"Advice on choosing who, my Lady?" Harry inquired, Lorelei nodded.

"Yes, to start with administer the basic psych exam that all Enforcers have to take. I know you Harry, I know your skills these people will become Enforcers or at least as close as they can come to it. After that use a physical test to weed out the ones that wouldn't be able to keep up in the long run. Then pick and choose from whoever is left." Lorelei told him, Harry bowed to her before remembering something.

"My Lady, don't Wizards lack the amount of Magic Circuits necessary to make practical use of Magecraft?" Harry asked to which Lorelei shook her head.

"That is a complicated question. The common theory is that Wizards only have one Magic Circuit to make use of and it can expand exponentially to make them stronger. While this is true to an extent it also wrong. Wizards do have more than one Magic Circuit but they will never have more than ten. They simply only have one active, since most Magi don't want anything to do with them most never learn how to make use of the dormant circuits. The argument has been made that in exchange for having one Magic Circuit that activates itself they have less Circuits over all. But it has never been proven or dis-proven. You will need to make them like you, specialists." Lorelei finished but could see another question coming. She wasn't disappointed.

"My Lady may I ask why then do I have twenty eight Magic Circuits instead of more then. I know that the Wizard Marshal added the twenty seven into me and I had one of my own and the other thing that he added to me but should I not have more circuits considering what you just told me?" Harry asked to which Lorelei shook her head.

"Under normal circumstances you would be right, but when has Zelretch ever done normal?" She asked rhetorically. Which caused Harry to nod, his mother figure definitely had a point there. "We have no idea what he did to you besides adding your new circuits and the other. But if the old bastard's normal workings apply here then we can probably make the assumption that he also tampered with your body somewhat besides adding your new additions. I have no idea what he did but it's probably what cost you whatever circuits besides the single one you have left and the additions." Lorelei finished before pulling out a file and handing it over. "Everything else you need to know is in here, have a nice day Harry."

Harry stood and bowed to the Vice Director, "you to, Lorelei."

**Three Days Later**

Harry walked calmly through the Bounded Field that separated Diagon Ally from the Muggle world. That file Lorelei had given him had far more than a plan for choosing student, she also had another project she wanted him to work on. Honestly Harry had no idea if what Lorelei had asked him to do would even work, that being said she still wanted him to try. It was this reason, along with the fact that he school book list had come, that had Harry in Diagon ally this morning.

The black haired Enforcer in training was carrying a briefcase at his side, booby trapped in the same way as the last one though with less currency inside. The black haired boy walked through the doors of Gringotts with a polite nod to the Goblin guards at either side of the doors, the nod was respectfully returned. Harry entered the marble foyer at a brisk pace and walked over to one of the available tellers a surly looking Goblin who, if the name tag was actually correct and not a joke, was apparently called Grabass. The Goblin gave him a quick once over with his eyes, obviously not being impressed he cocked his head to the side.

"Name?" Grabass asked in a bored tone.

"Harry Barthomeloi, here for an appointment with Director Ragnok." The black haired youth told the Goblin teller who immediately looked more alert.

"Thank you Mr. Barthomeloi, please come this way." Grabass told him walking away and gesturing for Harry to follow. It was less than five minutes later when Harry was standing in front of a very familiar set of doors which seemingly swung open of their own accord.

"Good morning Director Ragnok." Harry said bowing to the old Goblin, who nodded respectfully to the young Magi.

"Good morning, Enforcer Barthomeloi." Ragnok returned, the doors shut and the old Goblin immediately set up a silencing ward. "There now we may speak without fear of being over heard." Ragnok told the young Enforcer who nodded graciously in return. "I owe you a debt for telling me about that leak that we had," Ragnok spoke on no uncertain terms. Harry nodded in return before placing the briefcase on the table and opening it, inside sat three million pounds.

"I'm already aware and I'm calling it in," Harry stated bluntly. Harry didn't bother insulting Ragnok with insinuating that he would not do as Harry asked, the Goblin owed him an honor debt and Goblin's always paid their debts. "I need you to create a new account for me, same as the last one in terms of protection but under a different name. I also need it to look like the account has been in place for a while but the owner only just moved to England, then I need you to fabricate a past for this owner, and I need this past to be as solid as humanly possible. He needs to have a birth certificate, social security number, former and current places of residence and business contacts, the whole thing." Harry finished bluntly. Ragnok looked at him curiously.

"That does seem a bit much for a simple fake identity." He commented mildly, it was also illegal, very, very, illegal but that had never stopped him before, especially when there was a large profit to be made and Ragnok felt like he could smell a huge profit already. "Tell me what are you planning?" The old Goblin inquired, he had already made up his mind to help now he just wanted answers. Harry just sat back into his chair, a self-satisfied grin on his face.

"I can't say anything just yet all I will say however is that soon Ragnok, very, very, soon this world will be changing. Perhaps for the better and perhaps for the worse, when I make my move you will know it, of that I assure you Director when that happens you will have the chance to change this world." Harry finished, Ragnok looked Harry over, his eyes calculating.

"That is a very bold statement," He admitted at least, Harry just grinned.

"I will also make it to be true." Ragnok just nodded in acceptance, knowing that was all he was going to get from the enigmatic child.

"Now then to business, does this fake already have a name?" Ragnok asked to which Harry nodded.

"Indeed, his name is Walter, Walter C Dornez." Ragnok nodded writing the name down.

"Business practices?" Ragnok inquired.

"Successful importer and exporter," Harry answered, Ragnok nodded. "The rest I'm sure you can come up with, just send me a dossier on what back story you make so I can learn it and use the express route." The Director of Gringotts nodded again before looking at the money.

"If I'm right then that's three million pounds?" He asked to which Harry nodded. "Then that is about six hundred thousand Galleons. When everything is said and done and all the appropriate investments are made to make Walter C Dornez look like a real person and have a real business under your control you should have around Two hundred thousand Galleons left." The Gringotts Director told the black haired Enforcer in training, Harry nodded. "If there's nothing else?" Ragnok let the statement hang, Harry nodded and stood.

"Thank you Director," He said bowing to the old Goblin.

"Any time Enforcer Barthomeloi." Ragnok replied with a nod before looking back at the briefcase, Harry took the dismissal for what it was and walked out of the room leaving a planning Goblin behind. It didn't take Harry any longer to take some more money out of his vault and walk back out into Diagon, he could see children starting to turn up. He'd best head to Ollivanders now, it would save him some trouble in the long run, otherwise he might have to wait for a long line of children to be finished.

The doorbell to the store chimed as Harry entered, he looked back towards where he knew Ollivander was, inside his workshop.

"Master wand maker," Harry called out politely. The old man stuck his head out of the back room and smiled at the black haired boy.

"Good morning master Enforcer, here to let me look at your wand?" Ollivander asked a small smile on his face, Harry nodded a smile on his own as he grabbed his wand out of the holster on his belt.

"Indeed Master Wand Maker," Harry admitted handing his wand over to the smiling Ollivander. "And to ask a question that I think you may be able to help with." Harry added as Ollivander looked over the wand. The Wander Maker looked up a serious expression on his face.

"Really and what question would that be?" He inquired, Harry smiled. It was something he had been wondering about for a while. How had Abigail Potter survived the killing curse? Albus Dumbledore said it was because of love, because of the love of her Grandmother sacrificing her life to save the girl it had formed a barrier of love around her that Voldemort could not penetrate because he had blackened his soul to the point that such a powerful positive emotion could do damage to both him and his spells, Harry called bullshit.

There was no way in hell that all the criteria that allowed Abigail to survive had not been created before. So that meant either Abigail really was one of a kind or there was more going on than most knew, Harry was betting on option two.

"Do you have any theories on how Abigail Potter survived the killing curse? I know what Dumbledore said about love but that just doesn't seem to ring true to me, after all there is no way that those same conditions haven't been met before and yet Abigail Potter is still one of a kind, theories?" Harry asked, Ollivander looked down at his wand in a contemplative manner.

"Neither I nor anyone else knows of a way to stop the killing curse, this is naturally why Abigail Potter is considered unique. If there was such a way then it has been lost to the mists of time or has such a large cost that the minuses outweigh the pluses. Failing both of those it could simply be that whatever allows one to survive the killing curse requires a very specific series of events to work and one would have to engineer these events." Ollivander finished still looking at the wand before picking it up and handing it back to Harry.

Harry nodded, that fit with his theories so far. The killing curse was supposedly unblockable so naturally the Ministry of Magic had done extensive research on Abigail once she had survived, they found nothing. For Harry that told him one of two things about the girl, one the protection from the killing curse only applied to Voldemort and anyone else could still kill her with it, or two, the spell backfired before it hit her. Now it was just a matter of figuring out which theory was correct and how it came about. Considering that Quirrell had Voldemort attached to the back of his head and burned when Abigail touched him Harry was betting that the first theory was the correct one.

"Thank you, Master Wand Maker." Harry said bowing to Ollivander who smiled and walked back into his workshop as Harry exited the store and went back out into the, now blinding, afternoon sun of Diagon ally. Harry stiffened for a second as he saw her out of the corner of his eye. She was graceful and he could already tell she was deadly. Before he could make out more than the fact that her hair shone like burnished gold under the sunlight and made it down to her mid back she vanished into the crowd. Just as goose bumps rose on the back of his neck, he was being followed. That was never a good thing.

The Enforcer in training sighed before looking down at his school book list, might as well get started after all. Harry paid his follower no more mind, he had no more legally questionable business he needed to attend to after all so the stalker would only become a problem if they attacked, so he would let them go...for now. Harry looked down at the book list with mild apathy.

_The Standard Book of Spells, Grade 2 by Miranda Goshawk_

_Break with a Banshee by Gilderoy Lockheart_

_Gadding with Ghouls by Gilderoy Lockheart_

_Holidays with Hags by Gilderoy Lockheart_

_Travels with Trolls by Gilderoy Lockheart_

_Voyages with Vampires by Gilderoy Lockheart_

_Wanderings with Werewolves by Gilderoy Lockheart_

_Year with the Yeti by Gilderoy Lockheart_

Well it looked like he would need to start with Flourish and Blotts. Which already seemed to have a large crowd outside, Harry couldn't help the sigh that escaped his mouth. He really hoped it wasn't anything big, it would probably end up wasting his time, the black haired Enforcer in training ambled towards the shop noting that the crowd had gathered slightly further since he had looked at the list. He quickly discovered why when he looked at a sign out the front of the store.

_GILDEROY LOCKHEART_

_will be signing copies of his autobiography_

_MAGICAL ME_

_today 12.30 to 4.30pm_

Harry sighed again, well that explained it. He knew who Gilderoy Lockheart was of course. The man was practically a household name in the world of the wand waving wizard. Harry however had never bothered to read one of his books, mostly due to time constraints on his part. Apparently Lockheart was, according to his adoring public, a super-wizard. Able to do things that mere mortals could only dream of, again, Harry called bullshit. Fan's always overstated what a person had done it was hard to get an unbiased opinion off a fan of anything. That being said Lockheart's fan base did seem to be particularly vicious and shallow.

Harry cocked his head the sound of flesh hitting flesh could be heard from within the book store, on second thought he was just going to send a mail order to the store. The books were not worth the headache of getting caught up in whatever fight had just started inside. Harry walked calmly back to the Leaky Cauldron, the goose bumps on his neck not once going down.

Stepping inside the wizarding pub was something of a relief for Harry, he could just kick back and relax and eat his lunch. Something that he still hadn't had the enjoyment of partaking in and so the Enforcer in training did just that. Harry kicked back in a small booth by the entry door to the Cauldron so he could see everyone but not be seen by everyone. Now all he was waiting on was his meal, as it turned out the Landlord, a man by the name of Tom, had married the most wonderful Thai woman her Pad Thai was, apparently, to die for. So Harry ordered himself a plate and just sat back, he could have always tried some Mapo Tofu but Harry got a dark feeling from the dish so he left it right the hell alone.

Then something happened that he was not expecting, an annoyed looking Daphne Greengrass slumping almost lifelessly into the chair in front of him. Harry raised an eyebrow at the girl who just growled in return, Harry held up his hands in a surrender gesture before ordering refreshments and another plate of Pad Thai, hey at least if it sucked he wouldn't have to suffer alone. The two sat in silence before Harry decided to break it, it was starting to feel oppressive, not just awkward.

"So what do you need from me, Witch?" Harry inquired, the statement of Witch was by no means a friendly or endearing term. Harry was merely stating what Daphne was and reminding her that if she betrayed him he would kill her without blinking. But she almost thought she saw something else there, if only for a second.

"Just to talk for now Magus, nothing big yet." The blond haired girl replied in a lifeless tone. The word Magus was a reminder to Harry that she would betray him in an instant if she knew it would succeed. This was a dance that both had gotten very used to over their months inside Hogwarts, it was a game they played with each other. Both knew very well that one day they could well try to kill each other, that didn't mean that they wouldn't enjoy the dance while it lasted.

"Then by all means talk, I am happy to listen Witch." Harry replied, Daphne straightened slightly, the way he had said that, no she was imagining things.

"It's nothing too big for the moment, my family wants to expand their horizons a little." She admitted shaking off the feeling she had just moment before.

"I take it this is a bad thing?" Harry inquired, as normally expanding ones horizons was fine. The methods of how one pursued that expanded horizon however...

"No it is a good thing, if the contract that has been put in place works out my family stands to triple its yearly income this year. With continuing growth that would within six years' time multiply the current profits we make each year by seven." Daphne told him, Harry just nodded still looking at the girl's icy blue eyes. Wait a second, Icy blue? Her eyes had been pale green the last time he had seen her, yet it was definitely the same person. This bore some looking into.

"Hmm, then what are you concerned about Witch?" The black haired Enforcer in training asked, Daphne stiffened again. There it was, it was gone almost before she could make sense of it, almost before she could feel, but it was there, or, at least, she thought it was.

"It's about what they want in exchange for this new contract. My family is quite well known in potion circles as we supply the vast majority of the ingredients found within the UK with our various holdings both on shore and off shore. However the business that actually moves our product is owned by the Flint family with the Zabini family as their principle partners in the business." Daphne stopped as their food was placed before them and she smiled.

"You have good taste you know, the Pad Thai here is to die for." She told him before daintily placing some of the noodles into her mouth, Harry smirked.

"So I've been told," He admitted. "This is my first time trying it personally but it has been recommended to me a few times. However I must say it is a little bit of a surprise that the pure-blood princess actually loves food not from the UK, isn't that against some kind of code of yours Witch?" Harry asked, Daphne pouted slightly at the teasing tone in his voice. Not that either would ever admit to teasing or pouting, even if it was only slightly.

"Quiet you, besides there is no law against it. Though I do admit that most pure-bloods have, at best, disdain for anything not strictly British, me I'm more of a practical person. I don't care where something comes from if it's good I'll use it." The blond haired princess told the black haired killer.

"A good view to have," Harry replied. "I get the feeling you'd be a real pragmatist on the battle field and use whatever worked rather than whatever was honorable. I always did like working with people like that, they tend to live longer and be better at their jobs than most others." Daphne nodded slowly taking it as a complement. "At any rate continue, what else is bothering you Witch?" Harry asked, there it was, just a flash but she was sure it was there this time.

"Well my parents are trying to work out a new deal with the Flints and I was called in to watch the negotiations. As my father told me, I will one day be managing all of house Greengrass's affairs with help from my younger sister Astoria so the faster that I learn the business the better." Daphne told him, Harry nodded that was a sound business strategy.

"At any rate as the meeting went on longer they couldn't agree on a compromise that would allow the new deal to be seen as fair by both parties, and since they are the best magical import and export company in the UK we can't just tell them to go screw themselves and go elsewhere. If we did our profit margins would lower by quite an amount, granted it is an amount that we could live without but none of us a willing to take a twenty percent drop in profits if we don't have to." Daphne continued, Harry nodded again before interjecting.

"As interesting as this is Witch. It does not answer why you seemed so lifeless earlier." Harry replied, this time Daphne didn't stiffen but she did catch it. There was an emotion in his voice when he said Witch, she wasn't sure what one just yet but there was definitely an emotion there, and not a negative one.

"I was getting to that," Daphne huffed at the Magus who just smiled sarcastically. "Look you do understand that marriage contracts are still common place amongst the ancient houses right?" She asked him, see Harry nod in return Daphne continued. "Well the Flint family decided that since my age and their only sons ages are close enough a marriage contract should be implemented between the two of us. This would mean that both families would be bound together and thus our business agreement would be far more stable as it would be advancing a family agenda." Daphne finished looking up at the black haired Magi who nodded.

"I see," Harry said lowly. "I take it you are against this then, Witch?" There, there it was, just as he said the word 'Witch' she could hear it in his voice. Or at least, she thought she could, it was almost like she could hear genuine concern coming from the Magus before her, at a stretch Daphne supposed she could even call it fondness, though that would be stretching it a lot.

"Yes I am against it," Daphne admitted sighing. "Look as far as politically goes a marriage between Marcus Flint and I is fine. My problem is the way that the Flint family is going about making the contract happen. As I said earlier the Flint family decided that a marriage contract was what they wanted, right?" Harry nodded and Daphne continued. "The problem is that they are the only family out of the two of us that want that, my parents don't care for the contracts but the sad fact of the matter is that they may well be caused to cave into the Flint family's demands. While my family is by no means destitute the Flints have more money than us by a large amount and have put some not so veiled threats out about what could happen to us if we don't accept. But it's still all up in the air."

Harry nodded to the blond haired girl in front of him, there it was and he saw it even if it was just for a second. Hair like burnished gold that glittered even if the dim lighting of the cauldron. She wore white and silver, she disappeared again and Harry had to hold in a curse. It seemed like he was still being followed.

"I see," The black haired Enforcer in training stated. "However nothing has been finalised yet correct?" Daphne nodded and Harry gave her a tight smile. "Then I guess all's not lost yet right, you still might have a way out." Daphne opened her mouth to respond before an alarm went off around her wrist and her eyes went wide. She pushed the sleeve of her dress up and turned off the noise emitting watch around her left arm, a Rolex if he was not mistaken.

"Sorry Magus I got to run," Daphne told him getting up at the same time Harry did, the black haired Enforcer in training smiled at the blond haired Witch.

"That's fine I've got to go to, you know how it is. Places to go and people to kill." Harry said in a jovial tone, Daphne just nodded a little stiffly as he walked out of the Leaky Cauldron and back into the so called Muggle world. Daphne honestly considered that part of Harry to be the scariest, when he made remarks like that and you had no idea if he was telling the truth or not. It was also made slightly worse by the fact that Daphne was quite sure that Harry could sit down and have a pleasant lunch with people he planned to kill in some horribly depraved way later that day, she wasn't wrong.

**XXX**

Harry sighed as he walked down yet another of London's extensive back streets, he was still being followed. He had seen the girl again two more times since the Cauldron. Both times had been a simple fleeting glance before she vanished and it was putting Harry on edge, because he knew those actions. Those were the actions of a predator stalking its prey. He had done the same on more than one occasion when going after a criminal as part of his training.

It was kind of like saying, I am here, you know this, I am getting closer, you know this, I am going to kill you, you know this, and there is not a single thing you can do to stop me. It really, really, freaked a target out before he put them down, now that someone else was doing it to him Harry couldn't help but find it slightly annoying.

The black haired Enforcer in training simply turned down another ally, heading, slowly but surely, deeper and deeper into the more seedy parts of London. If he was going to kill this woman he would at least do the world the common courtesy of doing it in an out of the way place. No need for some child to have their childhood ruined because they saw him cut the bitches head off. Not that he supposed it would really matter to the child, because if the child had seen him kill someone then the child's life was forfeit, Harry hated loose ends after all.

Harry's mind drifted back down memory lane as he walked into darker and darker parts of London. His mind mostly dwelling on Freya, in the two days since he had got back he hadn't seen hide nor hair of the girl. When he took it up with Lorelei he had been told that she had been taken out with Waver to Paris where he was in the middle of finalising the Dead Apostle hunt that Harry would be part of. They would both be back tomorrow, he would need to get the little ball of sunshine a gift he really should have done that today. Maybe he could take her to Diagon ally so she could pick something out for herself, Harry had seen some very good jeweler's when he had been there.

_Harry exited the ally and came out onto yet another street, he couldn't help but smile, his stalker was getting closer. __Glass crunched under his foot as he walked forward again, the sun had almost __descended over the horizon, it bathed the area around him in a blood red glow, the sound of boots against the ground drew Harry's attention to behind him and he turned._

_There she was, the woman whose hair glowed like burnished gold, in her white clothing with silver buttons. Harry took the chance to take a closer look at his stalker than the glimpses that he had seen that day. Her feet were adorned by white riding boots, he could tell that the leather was hand worked, probably a one of a kind original design. Her pants were a light cream colour as was her blouse, the jacket she wore over her top was a pure snow white, at her hips Harry noticed to very large, very deadly, looking daggers, the hilts were wrapped in clean white leather while her belt buckle and the harnesses for the knives was worked in sliver._

_Harry's gaze continued up, her face was heart shaped, her lips red and full, a small delicate nose that was just slightly up turned. Though Harry could see a small scar marring it, probably where it had been broken in the past. The girls eyes were almond shaped her irises a deep violet that glittered with a golden light as the sun reflected off her hair. Harry's eyes went to her throat, a black band encircled it, Harry could feel the Prana coming off it and cursed mentally. A slave brand. She wouldn't be able to tell him who sent her even if he managed to take her alive. He also noted that the girl's age was closer to his than he had originally thought, she was only three, maybe four, years older._

_The girl's hands dropped to her daggers, Harry smiled, as Prana surged though his circuits. A few blocks over an alarm went off. Neither moved, both were still assessing the other, trying to decide on the best way to move and why. The woman took a half step forward and Harry did as well in order to match her._

_His mind was looking for the weapons he could use, neither Durandal nor Arondight. It simply took to long for him to create the blades and Harry had no idea how fast the woman before him was. That meant he was going to need a faster blade. Uriel and Belphegor immediately came to mind before being discarded as well, he had no idea if she would be able to escape, it would be annoying if he showed that he could create Mystic Codes only to have her escape later and come back more prepared to deal with him. It would have to be normal swords then._

_Harry's mind cascaded back over the years to his original two swords, the blades that Ureil and Belphegor were based on, no Mystic Codes, no hidden weapons on them, just pure well-made steel. Those blades, just like Uriel and Belphegor, were as much a part of Harry as his left arm was. It was these two blades, these two well forged pieces of steel that Harry chose to use in the upcoming death match._

_"Trace on." the words exited his mouth as less than a whisper as the blades dropped into Harry's waiting hand. No ornamentation adorned the pommel of the blade, the cross guard was straight black steel and the blades themselves was simply well forged wonders. The girl watched him as he watched the girl, both still sounding each other out. Harry could feel the Prana in his circuits reinforcing him limbs for the upcoming fight, as he tried to fight the maniacal grin that threatened to make its way onto his face. This was it, it was about to start, his next fight, his next adventure, his next death match. All the time Harry watched the girl, a window on the two's left shattered, neither moved or reacted to the sound except to put slightly more pressure on their left legs. The girl pulled the daggers from their sheaths and smiled at him as the glass continued to fall._

_"Come here beastie," she said smiling, still neither moved. The glass hit the floor and exploded into a shower of fragments, the two kicked off the ground charging at each other, the twin daggers came down as Harry's swords came up, this time he allowed the maniacal grin to form on his face, it was time, it was finally time, the next hunt had begun._

_**Sword Dancer: Mystic Eyes- Chapter One End.**_


	2. Chapter 2

**Sword Dancer: Mystic Eyes**

**Chapter Two: Before The Storm**

**Author's note-**

Hi guy's, now I know it's been awhile since I updated last but please don't lynch me, pretty please?

Okay now onto the real part of the authors note. First up while the poll has closed, thank you to everyone who voted. As for the results of said poll Harem won 147 votes to 50 votes for One Woman. As for how many women will be in the so called Harem which will be no more than four, that will be voted on after the Sword Dancer Series has finished or is nearing its end, more likely near it's end. Note that he will get one girlfriend before the series ends that I promise you, maybe two.

Now I'm sure that my last comment has taken most of you by surprise. How can you vote once the series is over after all? Well my beloved readers that is simple, Sword Dancer is a series that is a prequel to an even longer series. I haven't decided on what to call the next series yet, but suggestions are welcome, but it will be set in the Dresden Files after the seven Harry Potter books have been finished along with a few other intersecting series at times. Hopefully I can pull this off, if nothing else at least everyone now knows that the series does not end with the Harry Potter books.

To the second order of business the blond haired girl that was following Harry was an OC (Original Character for those of you who haven't been on this site for too long and are still learning all the short form), I haven't quite decided on how important she will be to the plot but she will be in the series from here on out. Yes she will be somewhat of a cliché character but that was also, partly, on purpose. I am hoping to use her to lampshade some of the cliché's that are associated with rescuing a slave. As well as deconstruct them to a degree, hopefully. Just wanted to point out that yes I know she is a cliché character, yes I know what I'm doing with her has been done before but I am hoping to take this cliché and have some fun with it, so everyone please enjoy Sword Dancer Mystic Eyes chapter two.

Also while I think about it, it was hard for me to find the motivation to write some parts of this chapter so I hope that they don't come off as too bland or uninteresting.

And as always thank my BETA reader Zimbolical.

**Story Start- **

The daggers came down again and met the long swords in a shower of sparks. The girl kicked out at his knee and Harry responded with a stab at her stomach. She flipped backwards and threw one of the knives concealed in her sleeves at him. The blade glinting a bloody red in the fading light, Harry's left blade flashed out and knocked it off course just as the girl charged in again. Her daggers went after his tendons with ruthless precision, only to be rebuffed by flashing swords. The fight was lasting longer than Harry had been expecting, so far it had lasted a full ten minutes and looked as if it would be lasting quite a bit longer.

That didn't surprise him as much as it should have, Harry had really half-assed his reinforcement so he was moving nowhere near his full speed but he was still faster than an ordinary human and that was what confused him somewhat, how was the girl keeping up with him so easily? The daggers went high, Harry let his knees give out and slid to the floor cutting out at the girl's legs, she responded with a graceful jump and another throwing knife. That was another thing that had confused him, why was she only going for disabling blows?

Sure it was good practice to go for things like tendons and muscle groups, hell Harry made use of that himself. But even then the girl hadn't made anything even coming close to a fatal shot since they began to fight. That could mean one of three things, the first, that whoever sent her wanted him alive for some reason. Two, that this was meant to be a message and they wanted him to be maimed at the end of this fight so that he would have to live with the embarrassment. Or finally, three, the girl liked playing with people before she killed them. Harry really didn't see any of them as particularly good options.

Harry spun hard to the left and avoided a dagger strike, his left leg shot out at the girl's right knee. The golden haired slave met it with a kick of her own, matching him in both strength and speed, slightly surprising the Enforcer in training, the knife that she threw at his temple however was quite expected and was quickly batted out of the way by one of his swords as the other one attempted to take the girls head from her shoulders. She slid to the ground and answered with a slash at his Achilles tendon. Harry jumped in response and stabbed straight down. The girl flipped herself onto her hands and then back flipped to her feet, smiling like the Cheshire cat the whole time.

The two stopped for the first time since their match had begun, they said nothing, the girl's foot tapped on the side walk in a seeming random pattern. Harry could tell that the pattern was anything but random, that was Morse code. The girl's foot continued tapping as she watched him and Harry deciphered it in his head. The first 'words' she said narrowed down his list of suspects considerably when it came to who could have sent her.

'Sorry nothing personal but the idiot wand waver that told me to do this wants you maimed. Sorry I can't stop myself but I'm just a slave.' The last was 'said' with the accompanying shrug of her shoulders. Harry fought, and won, against the small grin that threatened to break out on his face, and tapped the point of one of his blades on the concrete.

'I won't say its fine but I'll agree to nothing personal. Don't suppose you can tell me who sent you, even a hint would be nice.' Harry tapped out in return while the girl wore a small smile.

'Sorry,' She replied, 'Can't tell you anything specific, slave brand and all that.' Harry nodded in return readying his blades at the same time the girl readied her daggers. 'We shouldn't talk for much longer if the little prat watches my memories then he might grown half a brain and wonder why our feet are tapping so much.' That was all the warning that she gave before launching herself at him again and Harry found himself fighting once more.

A pair of throwing knives was aimed at his eyes, not thrown hard enough to kill but only to blind, Harry batted them out of the way with his sword which then flashed out at the girls arm. Her knives crossed and she bent her knees as she absorbed the force of the blow, all the while Harry was memorising the slave brand on her neck. The girl was either lulling him into a false sense of security or she really hated the people she worked for, not exactly something uncommon for slaves.

As for the reason that Harry was memorising the slave brand, well that was actually quite simple. If they both survived this then he had no doubt that she would be sent after him again, if he freed her then she would likely be quite grateful. Hopefully she would be grateful enough to work for the Clock Tower in exchange for protection for any crimes that she may have committed as a slave. Considering her skill with the blade Harry had no doubt in his mind that the girl had killed people before, she could probably use that protection.

Harry just hoped it wasn't too hard to break that slave brand, it wasn't exactly a complicated piece of magic or Magecraft to break. To put it simply the slave brand, or slave seal, did two things. The first was that it forced the wearer to take and follow the orders of the family if they didn't it inflicted pain. Its other function was to ensure that the wearer couldn't tamper with it themselves. The way to break the seal was quite easy, the slave seal was created by a runic combination, by creating the opposite combination it would break, not too hard. The problem came in when in order to undo the seal not only did one need the counter formula but also the Prana of the owner of the slave, of the two Harry was far more concerned about the second part.

The daggers came forward again only to be met with the flashing steel of his swords, a shower of sparks illuminating the now dark street. Harry spun on the balls of his feet, swinging his left blade out wide, the girl dropped to the floor allowing the blow to go above her head, what it didn't stop however Harry's right hand blade was coming down hard at the top of her head. She crossed her daggers and allowed the blow to push her back, falling into a roll to absorb the rest of the force behind the blow and coming up into a low fighting stance her daggers crossed protectively across her chest.

Harry could hear police sirens getting closer, and grimaced. His foot tapped against the side walk.

'Truce?' he asked in Morse code, the girl nodded back, her own feet tapping.

'Sure, you got a way to free me?', Harry nodded. 'I can't believe that the old slave attacks someone and then they free them cliché actually works in real life.' Even her Morse code seemed to have a tone of disbelief about it. 'Then again I'm not about to look a gift horse in the mouth and I'm guessing you're not about to throw away all the free info you get if you can free me, you have a way to track me?' she asked, foot tapping.

'I'm going to need some of your blood for that.' Harry admitted, his own foot tapping out his reply. The girl nodded, the sirens were getting closer. All types of Magic users could exercise a degree of control over someone if they had either that person's blood or their name. Names said from the lips of the person it belonged to had power. However with the way people were, always changing, the degree of power that a name had was in an almost constant state of flux, thus Harry personally preferred to use blood.

'We'll work the rest out next time.' She told him, her foot tapping as her body tensed, Harry nodded his own body tensing for their last engagement of this little fight. The girl charged, Harry jumped, allowing the two throwing knives to fly underneath him harmlessly. The black haired Enforcer in training spun in midair, his right blade leading his body in a downward strike. The girl smiled and brought her daggers up crossing them and bending her knees to take the weight of the blow. Harry's left blade darted under her guard and left a small scratch across her abdomen, the girl jumped back and both watched each other, eyes unblinking.

The girl smiled and sheathed her daggers in one smooth movement. Before jumping towards a nearby street lamp. Her feet made impact with the lamp and she pushed off, blond hair glinting in the artificial light. She grabbed the edge of a nearby roof and hauled her body up before smiling down at the Enforcer in training.

"Well it's been fun kid, see you later." She said brightly before disappearing over the roof tops. Harry gave a mocking bow in the direction the girl had disappeared in before wiping the blood off his Traced swords. He was going to need that later after all. The sirens had gotten closer, Harry walked into the darkness of a nearby ally and vanished into the London night. By the time the police would arrive, called by one of the families inside the houses, both combatants would be long gone. Leaving behind them far more questions than answers.

**XXX**

The black haired Enforcer in training shook himself off as he woke up in his old room inside the Clock Tower. Weaponry scattered haphazardly around, Harry scratched the back of his head it had been a day since the confrontation with the girl, he had constructed his tracker as soon as he got back and could feel her now. She was still in the city, which was good. It could be useful later when he needed to arrange another 'meeting' with her. The girl was good, he would give her that and she was very, very good.

Fortunately she also didn't like her masters, that was fortunate it could well give him a very useful pawn in the future. Still he didn't have the complete story so she could still be putting him on but Harry doubted it. That being said if he wanted to break that seal around her neck Harry was going to need to break the formula and then somehow get his hands on her former masters Prana to unlock it. But before all that he needed the entire formula, Harry had managed to memorise around eighty percent of the brand but it was not complete, he was going to need to see it again before he could really get to work.

Harry sighed, this was going to be a pain. Still he should probably thank whoever had sent the girl after him, they had provided him with a wonderful tool if he could get her under Lorelei's control. That being said what did he know about the person who sent her? Harry mused on that for a second before pulling out a piece of paper and a pen and took notes. When he was done it was actually quite a short list, not that it surprised him, that being said she had actually told him quite a bit about who sent her despite probably being told not to.

It was one of the weaknesses of the slave brand. It only enforced the orders in the exact way they were phrased. For example if the person who ordered the girl to attack him told her not to reveal his or her identity then the girl couldn't, well she couldn't do so directly anyway. The order did not stop her from giving out hints as to who sent her. It just stopped her saying it or implying it outright. She had to be vague and let the person she warned work it out from there, Harry looked down at his list.

First the girl had used the words 'idiot wand waver' that meant, if she hadn't been ordered to lay a false trail, that the attack wasn't coming from the Clock Tower but from outside. From the world of the wand waving wizard. So the first question he needed to ask himself was who in the world of the wand wavers wanted, or needed for that matter, him maimed.

Second, whoever ordered the girl to attack him wanted him maimed. That meant that they wanted him to live with a crippling injury, so it was probably some form of revenge. Harry grimaced, who would want revenge on him badly enough to do something as ridiculous as this? Harry considered it for a second, it was probably a pure-blood, they were the only ones with such a huge and insufferable streak of pride in them to do something like this for, what was probably, a small insult.

Third was the term of phrase she used to describe who sent her, 'little prat'. Probably meant someone young, which did make sense really. Most pure-blood wizards didn't take so called insults well but the older ones usually had more control than to do something as ridiculous as this. So the girl was probably a slave to one of the older pure-bloods while the younger was using her, so whoever sent her was probably the heir to the house, or close to it. They were also probably ruled by their passions and impulses rather than their logic, or else they wouldn't have sent an assassin to maim him. Attacking someone like him who was a ward of the noble house of Barthomeloi, a ward of it's current head no less, would be enough to lunch a full scale investigation into who had sent the woman to maim him had he actually been injured. That probably would have ended badly for whoever sent the girl.

It didn't take Harry long to come up with his most likely suspect, one above even Daphne, she would have had more sense than to pull something this obvious. Either that or he had overestimated her by a lot, Harry sighed. Well if it was who he thought it was and he really could free the girl from her slave brand he would let the little moron live, for now.

He would treat him as a loose end that he would be sure to tie up, eventually. Harry really did hate loose ends but considering how much information the girl could provide him if he could free her he would allow the boy to live, a kind of thank you Harry guessed, he would still be killed eventually just not right away. To be brutally honest the kid, if it really was him, was a very little fish in a very large pond.

Harry's mind moved off his, admittedly morbid, thoughts of the impending murder he would no doubt be performing at some point in the future and onto the far more pleasant topic of Freya. The little blond haired ball of sunshine would be coming back today, maybe he could take her out to Diagon and buy her a present.

The black haired Enforcer in training liked that idea, he hadn't seen the little ball of sunshine in a while now after all. Harry smiled to himself as he walked out of his room and down towards the cafeteria, he'd checked the clock before he left, it was two hours past the lunch rush. That meant that he would need to cook his own, a small price for the peace and quiet that would be afforded to him since so few people would be there right now.

Harry whistled to himself as he ambled down the hallways of the Clock Tower. It was naturally very hard to keep a building that housed so many Magi secret and safe, especially with all of the advances in technology in recent years. Most Magi made the assumption that it was some kind of Bounded Field that kept the various facets of England's Government from attempting to come inside. That was partially true but not the whole truth. The Nobles argued that it was their influence that kept the Clock Tower from having to host outsiders and worthless non-magi, like the first theory this one actually had some merit to it. As the influence of the Nobles did actually help in keeping unwanted people out of the Clock Tower. Still every Enforcer that heard either of these theories had to try very hard to keep from bursting out in laughter, because they knew the truth.

The Clock Tower was listed as a military installation by the government of Great Britain. More specifically it was listed as a top secret military R and D lab with an attachment of spec ops, which wasn't too far from the truth really.

The agreement between the Clock Tower and the government of Britain was simple, any paranormal or supernatural threat that came inside their borders would be handled by the Tower. With some exceptions for things like Dementors that were the subject of the Ministry of Magic, in exchange for this the Government of Great Britain did three things for the Clock Tower.

First they stopped any investigation into any building or business owned by the Magi, Magi looked after their own problems after all. The only exceptions to this rule were when there was either a murder or the problem was simply too big to be contained. The second was that the crown would help with the Clock Towers information network and ran information interference when a Magi action became to public. Finally they actually funded the Clock Tower, partially anyway, yes the Clock Tower actually had a budget given to them each year by the Government of Great Britain, where did most of the researchers think they got all those expensive toys to play with from? Or the research grants? That kind of stuff wasn't free after all. The money had to come from somewhere. As wonderful as Magecraft was it hadn't managed to create money out of thin air yet, not that anyone would actually be willing to share a spell like that if they did know it.

Magecraft, after all, was a finite resource, to use an analogy to explain it, if there was a spell that could create one pound of gold from thin air and could only be used once a year then the person who knew the spell would get the one pound of gold all to themselves. On the other hand however if say a thousand people knew the spell it would still only create one pound of gold which would then be divided between that thousand people, not much gold for anyone really.

It was the same basic principle with Magecraft in general, in other words the less people who knew how to use it the more powerful it was, conversely the more people who knew how to use it the less powerful it was. It was one of the major reasons that the Magi was so protective the knowledge to perform Magecraft, they didn't want to have too many people to use it for fear of losing some power. Ten people or less like his to be apprentices wouldn't make a difference they were only really concerned if millions more people began using Magecraft. To be fair it was something of a legitimate concern.

It was this fact that had also started a theory of Harry's. The theory was simply an explanation for why there were so many different types of magic users. The Wand Wizards, The Magi, The True Wizards, Ect…. Though Harry had no way of proving it his theory was that each of the groups relied on separate systems to actualise their mysteries and as such they could coexist as they were not all drawing from the same resource, oh they all used Prana certainly, but Prana was just the energy source.

Harry theorised that while the systems were different enough to be separate they all relied on the same energy source. Kind of like different kinds of appliances, all, or at least most, appliances ran on electricity the way it was accessed was the same for the most part. To make this more applicable to Magecraft. All of the mysteries performed by the different groups of Wizards and Magi all used the same power source, Prana, but they all drew from a separate resource after that, allowing all of the groups to exist together without suffering a major decrease in power. Or at least that was the theory.

Still Harry knew he wasn't the first to come up with this theory. However just like all the others he lacked a way to test it. He did however have some small amount of proof he could offer to prove his theory correct. The Trace that monitored all under-age Wizardry in the UK. Unlike what some children thought the Trace was not all powerful and the Ministry of Magic actually had books and such that told people how it worked, it was not exactly a great secret after all.

In the early days of the world, when Rome had yet to invade England and the entire country was just a mess of warring tribes the Druids of each tribes would create huge Bounded Fields and Wards over there tribes area. These Bounded Fields and Wards detected any use of Prana in the area that wasn't used by a Druid of that tribe, a sort of early warning system, the Trace actually piggy backed off these old Wards and Bounded Fields, by linking them together and adding some newly created ones they had a mixed Bounded Field and Ward system that covered the entire UK.

After this had been done it would have been easy to detect the use of Prana anywhere inside the United Kingdom, the problem with this was that the Wand Wizards that wanted to use it could not get the Wards and Bounded Fields to do exactly what they wanted so they had to change them again. Instead of making them sense Prana they refined them so that they could sense the particular energy that came off a Wand Wizard when they cast a spell, then refined it further so they could actually tell what spell had been cast in what area.

As for why the Clock Tower was happy to let the Ministry of Magic do this was quite simple. They didn't care for the Ward and Bounded Field scheme. To be honest it was incredibly easy to fool. All it would have taken was the right combination of Runes and you would have been invisible to the Bounded Field anyway. All in all the Clock Tower simply felt that the system was more trouble than it was worth. Hell even now hundreds of years later the Ministry of Magic still hadn't worked out all the kinks of the system. It could only give them an area that a spell was performed in and what the spell was. After that the Ministry had to do all the heavy lifting.

A good example would be if a spell was used in number four Privet Drive. The Bounded Field would tell the Ministry that a spell had been used in that general area, after that someone had to manually narrow it down to number four, after that they had to check over what under-aged Wizards lived in the area and if there was more than one then they had to send a summons to the Ministry out to all of them so they could work out who did it, like he said the system was not exactly fool proof. It was also the reason that magical parents were responsible for their own children, in a magical house hold where dozens of charms, amongst other spells, were used every day it would be almost impossible to pin one of them on a child so the Ministry just let the parents handle it.

As for what all of this had to do with his theory it was a quite simple, if a rather tenuous link, the Ministry had to refine the Wards and Bounded Fields to sense the energy given off only by Wand Wizards. If they were all drawing from the same resource overall then the energy shouldn't be specific only to Wand Wizards, or at least that was what Harry thought. Like he said it was a tenuous link at best.

The black haired Enforcer in training gave a short start when he realised he had just walked into the kitchen. Looked like he had been thinking for just a little too long, Harry gave a self-deprecating chuckle and walked towards the fridge. The Clock Tower had strict eating times, if you wanted something cooked by someone in the cafeteria you had to eat between six and eight for breakfast, twelve and fifteen hundred for lunch, the lunch rush itself was considered to be between twelve and fourteen hundred, and nineteen hundred and twenty one hundred for dinner, as Harry wanted to eat at four O'clock, or sixteen hundred, he was cooking his own food. The guys on lunch shift had already packed up and left. Still no one minded if you used the kitchen, you just had to make sure to clean up after yourself and be out of there by seventeen hundred. It also helped that this wasn't the only kitchen in the Tower, they did have two other cafeteria's as well.

Harry just whistled to himself as picked out some chicken from the fridge and set about slicing it, he wasn't looking for extravagant so he was going to try to make this quick. Luckily all of the things he wanted were readily available. The Black haired Enforcer in training set a pot of water on to boil and began to cut up mushrooms, it was going to be a simple spaghetti dish, he didn't think it even had a name. The chicken was added to a pan and made a sizzling sound as it hit, Harry smiled to himself and added a little more of it than he should, he had a sneaking suspicion that he would be having a guest, or two, for lunch. He stirred the chicken and added the Fettuccine to the boiling water. His arm drifted across his chest, slightly knocking the P226 concealed in a shoulder holster on his right hand side.

The nine mil was one of the two guns he used, while the guns themselves were not a Mystic Code the bullets that they shot could well be called one. Harry added a can of tomato puree to the chicken and a dash of white wine, before throwing some mushrooms in and stirring again and turning the pan down to simmer. The bullets were standard nine millimeter rounds, with one outstanding difference, they were engraved very, very, lightly with runes. Not to the point where it would affect the bullets flight path but enough to get an effect, Harry stirred the chicken, tomato and mushroom mix before adding some cream to the dish and stirring it again.

What the runes did was quite simple, they did nothing until the bullet hit something, when that happened they super-heated the bullet to just below leads melting point of three hundred and twenty seven point five degrees Celsius. It allowed the bullet to melt its way through damn near anything. Well it couldn't do it through some metals but flesh and blood targets got ripped straight through.

However the time it took to engrave the bullet was ridiculous and only one person knew how to do it and she charged an arm and a leg for it. The cost was the main reason that Harry only used normal nine millimeter rounds until he found something that actually required him to use the Mystic Code bullets. The black haired Enforcer in training drained the Fettuccine off and added the pasta to the sauce and washed the saucepan. Harry smiled while serving up his creation into three bowls and gave the pan a quick wash and dry before picking up the bowls and some parmesan cheese and walking out to the dining area to see if he was right.

"Look you brought me lunch!" An exited voice yelled, Harry sighed, yes it seemed he was right. The black haired boy turned and found himself face to face with one of the Clock Towers most eccentric residents. The woman looked to be in her mid-twenties, her hair was a pale white and her eyes a fiery green. The easily excitable woman was wearing overalls and black boots, honestly if she was any less good at her job she probably would have been kicked out of the Clock Tower a long, long, time ago.

Standing in front of Harry was a woman by the name of Nadia, he had no idea what her last name was, the second child of a Magi couple that was actually trained instead of being handed off. Or at least that's what she told people, honestly no one had any idea where Nadia came from, she had never told and Harry had never asked. More importantly she was one of, it not the best, Mystic Code Crafters that the Mages Association had to offer, she was also the only one who would touch his, or Wavers for that matter, more heretical ideas, such as combining technology and Magecraft.

Harry personally didn't know what the damned problem was with combining Technology and Magecraft, he was of the personal opinion that it just made the Nobles feel stupid since they had no idea how to use most of it.

"Afternoon Nadia," Harry said placing the bowls on the table. The woman smiled and sat down before helping herself without asking. She was normally quite reserved around most people but once she had been around you long enough all of that went straight out the window, her prices also went down, if only slightly.

"Sooo, how was your little vacation?" The older woman asked smiling at him. Harry barely held himself back from sighing, it seemed he would be playing twenty questions.

"Pretty good, learned some new things, made some connections, killed a few people, embarrassed others...you know how it goes." Harry replied nonchalantly, Nadia nodded still smiling.

"Sounds like pretty standard fare for you," She observed in between bites of pasta. "Still some of those reports you sent back really made some waves, that one about molecular reconstruction especially. Hell I'm going to the lecture that is being done on it next week by that specialist that's brought in, you coming to it?" Nadia asked, Harry took a moment to consider before nodding.

"Yeah I'll turn up, should be good to get some more knowledge on it if nothing else. That is assuming that I'm still alive then." The black haired Enforcer in training replied taking another bite of his pasta, Nadia nodded and looked at the bowl of pasta that was left.

"Hungry were we?" She asked in a teasing tone, Harry just smirked in reply and shook his head.

"Not really, I had a feeling that I would be seeing you, you always did hate eating with most of the others after all." Harry told her, causing Nadia to take on a mock indignant expression.

"Are you saying I'm fat and eat too much!?" She exclaimed in a fake angry voice before dissolving into laughter, Harry shook his head again.

"Not at all, I'm expecting company." Harry told her seriously, Nadia looked at him for a second. Her mouth opening to ask the obvious question before being cut off by a sharp exclamation of.

"HARRY!"

The two Magi turned to see the person who had yelled his name and smiled. The girl was small, something to be expected of a six year old. Bright blond hair and big blue eyes, the girl smiled at him and charged, Harry stood from the chair and kneeled down as the blond missile slammed into his gut forcing the air out of him, Harry wrapped his arms around the girl and hugged her tightly.

"How have you been Princess?" Harry asked, in his arms right then was a six year old Freya. One of the very, very, few people that Harry cared for in the Clock Tower. The only other people on that list were Lorelei, Waver and Nadia. Harry would include Nic and Pern in the list but as they didn't ever reside inside the tower he didn't, they only stopped by on business or to see him and Freya. Harry looked down at the blond haired bundle of sunshine and felt his mind drift back down memory lane, he made no attempt to shake it off even though he hated the memory. After all even though he regretted what he did it had brought Freya into his life so he needed to remember it so he never took her for granted, or forgot what he took away from her.

**Two Years Ago**

A nine year old Harry walked into a small apartment block in down town London. The association had recently had a Magi go rouge and delve into forbidden research, fortunately not into how to become a Dead Apostle, no this Magi had focused on Reality Marbles.

Reality Marble, was a Magecraft that comes close to being real magic, and as a taboo among taboos and mystery among mysteries, it was considered one of the pinnacles for a Magus for which research has been banned by the Association. Mostly due to most of its researchers going insane after decades of failed attempts. They were the natural abilities of the highest ranking demons and elementals.

At any rate the apartment that he had been sent to look at had been one of many that the Magi had rented and, apparently, he had stored some of his notes there. Considering that the Clock Tower knew that the Magi in question was not at the site it was not considered dangerous, add to that fact that a team had already been in and gone through it once and, hopefully, disabled all the traps it was definitely not considered dangerous.

The Association just wanted to give the apartment one last look over before someone brought it just in case the team had missed something. Harry knew that the likely hood of the team missing something was slim to none, no this was just busy work, a test to see if he could follow orders if you will.

The young Magus opened the door of apartment 221B Bakers Street and walked inside shutting and locking the door behind him. Inside was exactly what he had been expecting to find, a completely bare room with nothing inside of it, the team had already taken everything of value. Harry walked forward slowly, he knew this was a farce but he would at least complete his job properly. Then it hit him, that sweet smell of honey, he knew that smell, which was the smell of Prana. Harry was instantly on alert as he stalked over to one of the walls he could smell it, it was so small, so insignificant that it would almost be impossible to detect but Harry's nose had never led him wrong when it came to Prana.

"Trace on." The two words were said with an almost surgical precision that a child should not possess. A simple dagger formed in Harry's right hand, the black haired Enforcer in training thrust the blade into the wall in front of him without hesitation, sinking it to the hilt in one blow. Harry dragged down on the blade before pulling it to the side, by the time he was done Harry had a perfectly square hole in the wall and then he smiled to himself. The smell of Prana was even stronger now, Harry knew what it was too, it was a cloaking rune array, Harry quickly inscribed the counter runes in the air and watched with childlike delight as the cloaking array failed and a stack of paper came into existence. Harry looked at the first sheet, it was nothing big or overly important and probably why the Magi had left the notes.

The black haired child looked over the notes quickly, just like he had thought there was nothing of consequence left. Or at least he thought there was nothing of consequence left, Harry didn't know for sure he was not anywhere near finished his training as either an Enforcer or a Magus so it was entirely possible that he had missed something. The boy placed the notes into a bag he had brought with him and quickly put it on his back, he would do one last quick check before leaving. The final sweep of the apartment didn't take long, fifteen minutes at most. By the end however Harry was reasonably certain that he hadn't missed anything.

The black haired child walked calmly towards the front door, whistling a jaunty tune the entire time. He did need to get out of here fast after all, no sense in waiting around for something to go wrong. But Murphy is a sadistic son of a bitch and naturally his law had to come into play right that second. The door opened admitting a young mother and father that were holding a four year old along with, what appeared to be, a real estate agent just as Harry crossed a hidden Bounded Field. A Bounded Field specifically designed to tell the owner of said field that the notes were being removed. The Runic Circle ignited allowing all of the mundane people to see the Magecraft at work, Harry's pupils dilated in panic.

**Flashback End**

Harry didn't really remember what happened after, only that there was a lot of blood. The faces of the young mother, father and the real estate agent looking up at him in horror as he drove the knife into their throats. The frightened blue eyes of the young four year old, a four year old whose eyes changed from a piercing blue to a stunning violet. The Mystic Eyes of Whisper, eyes with the ability to implant hypnotic suggestions into the minds of others. When Freya had first activated them after seeing him kill her parents she had given in a single order 'die'.

His knife had moved burring itself into his stomach, it would have been his heart if not for one thing. His own eyes activating at the same time, at the time that he and Freya had met Harry had never before sent Prana into his eyes to reinforce them. After all reinforcement was dangerous on the human body and if he didn't understand his eyes correctly then it could have destroyed them. But thanks to the little girl forcing her Prana into his body through his eyes Harry's own were activated giving him enough strength to counter the hypnotic suggestion, if not erase it completely. He had said one thing to the girl after his eyes activated as well, 'sleep'. It had been painful but even with the stomach wound the nine year old had been able to call for help from Lorelei from his cell phone. She came and picked him up, personally, ten minutes later.

While Harry was many things he was not stupid, if not for the random chance that he had Mystic Eyes he would have died. That was not in question, the encounter between he and the girl to be known one day as Freya had another effect on the boy. They made him train harder and learn more he had survived due to nothing but luck, and Harry knew that, he would not rely on luck to save him again.

Lorelei had kept Freya alive, and sedated, until Harry had woken up and told her of the events. The Vice-Director of the Mages Association had asked him what he would do with the girl. Harry had understood later that Lorelei had already decided what she wanted to do with the girl she was merely allowing him to voice his own opinion. The black haired child had told Lorelei that he would erase the girls memories then have them replaced with something that would make her loyal to Lorelei.

As it turned out his mother figure had taken his suggestion and implemented it, making Freya think that Harry and she had taken her away from an abusive orphanage after her parents had died, a little cliché sure but it worked. Freya trusted Harry and Lorelei more than anyone else and was more than happy to study Magecraft, a win in their books. It was only later that Harry had started caring for Freya as a person and looked on her as a little sister, before that she had been a science experiment, at best, for him.

The black haired Enforcer in training was brought out of his musing as Freya yelled his name again.

"HARRY!" She called out in anger, "Are you listening to me!?" Freya demanded, Nadia chuckled at the little girl and Harry had to hold down a laugh himself at how cute she looked when she pouted.

"Of course I am Princess, of course I am." Harry assured the small blond who's pout morphed into a smile.

"Good," She stated simply with all the arrogance of a Queen that was sure her orders would be obeyed. Harry and Nadia just stifled another round of chuckles at the cute look on the little girls face. Unlike Harry, Freya was not being raised to be an Enforcer but rather a diplomat. That was not to say the girl did not know how to fight or use her Magecraft, she most assuredly did, but rather than focusing on it like Harry had combat took a back seat to diplomacy and politics. It was the reason she had been sent with Waver, so that she could see what diplomacy could accomplish first hand.

In this case that was getting three teams of ten Enforcers onto French soil by convincing the French Ministry of Magic that it would be a good thing, naturally all Waver had to do was drop the fact that the person, or rather the thing, they were going after was a Dead Apostle and the French were all too happy to help. This gave Harry the impression that the French had already sent a team after the Apostle that was probably already dead so now they chose to rely on professionals to do the job.

Under normal circumstances when a Dead Apostle showed up that wasn't inside the UK the Clock Tower almost never bothered with killing them, the exception was only made of the Apostle was a former member of the Mages Association or one of the twenty seven Dead Apostle Ancestors, it simply wasn't their problem. They let the Church or the Ministry of that country take care of it.

Failing that the Mages Association, of which the Clock Tower was a part, was split into three international branches. The Clock Tower, Atlas and The Sea of Estray, each of which had some form of agreement with the government of the country they resided within. Most of these agreements were more or less the same as the one that had been formed between the Clock Tower and the Government of Great Britain, so the world was fairly well covered when it came to Apostle attacks, amongst other things. With the exception of the far East, they handled their problems themselves, to be honest both the Mages Association and the Church really didn't care about the far East all that much. As Hans Gunsche was a former member of the Clock Tower the ball was firmly in their court, so to speak.

"Soooo, Princess want some lunch?" Harry asked, presenting the mangled pasta dish. It honestly didn't taste that bad, in fact Harry quite liked the taste, but presentation of a dish was not exactly something he was good at. The little girl nodded and jumped up into his previously occupied seat, Harry held back a long suffering sigh at that, she always did this. That was his seat goddammit. The Enforcer in training grabbed the last bowl and placed it in front of the girl before slipping into the seat next to her. Still he did suppose it was only a seat, Nadia hid a chuckle before making whipping motions when Freya wasn't looking. Harry just gave her the middle finger in reply causing her to grin.

"So when do you leave?" The Mystic Code Crafter asked him, Harry shrugged. He honestly didn't know when he would be leaving with the rest of the team only that it would be soon, no point in letting the Apostle get more dug in then he already was, or worse, give him more time to escape.

"No idea I would wager it will be soon though." Harry replied, the white haired woman nodded as Harry turned to Freya again. "Any good princess?" He asked, getting a grin and a nod in reply. "Since we haven't seen much of each other want to go out tomorrow?" Harry inquired looking down at Freya who stopped eating and turned to him a big smile on her face.

"Can we!?" She demanded, Harry nodded a small smile gracing his face. "And you'll buy me a present?" Freya asked, her big blue eyes almost watering as she turned the dreaded puppy dog look on the black haired Enforcer in training.

"Of course I will," Harry told the six year old. 'I spoil her way to much' he thought to himself.

"Actually neither of you will be going out to London tomorrow." Came a calm voice from the entrance to the cafeteria. The group of three's heads all swiveled at the same time. Standing in the door way was a man that looked to be in his late twenties to early thirties. His black hair came down just past his shoulders, framing a hard, but kind, face. Dark green, almost black, eyes regarded the three sitting at the table before him. His clothing was of the finest quality, a dark grey suit with a black under shirt. A long red coat that fell to the back of his knees and a gold scarf settling nicely over his shoulders.

Standing in the doorway was Lord El-Melloi II, also known as Waver Velvet, former master of Rider of the Fourth Holy Grail War and one of its only survivors. Though he had also acquired quite a few more unofficial titles since his return to the Clock Tower after the disaster that was the Fourth War. Such as, Professor Charisma, Master V and, Harry's personal favourite, Great Big Ben Londonster (no seriously he really does have this as a nickname check it up on the type moon wiki). While Harry admittedly had no idea how Waver got that last one he still loved teasing him about it. Much to the man's ire and general annoyance. The teasing was not helped by the fact that Waver had a rather large amount of younger female admirers in the Tower, something that seemed to annoy the man to no end. Not because he batted for the home team but rather because all the attention not only got distracting but made it hard for him to get, let alone hold onto, a, as Waver put it, decent girlfriend. Needless to say Harry enjoyed needling Waver about that as well.

"Why not!?" Freya demanded in a childish voice, though anyone who knew her could tell you it was only for show. She was still raised as a Magi, any childishness that she had was most likely by choice, as she knew, and normally acted, better. After all in the right situation Freya could be just as ruthless, perhaps even more so than Harry was.

"Because the kid," Waver shrugged his shoulders in Harry's direction. "Has to get moving, he has an Apostle hunt to get to." With those words all traces of childishness and cheer disappeared from Freya her young eyes were now glinting with an intelligence one would expect from someone ten years her senior. Nadia looked grim and as for Harry himself, the black haired Enforcer in training just pushed his bowl away from him and stood.

"When do I leave?" He asked with his voice perfectly controlled. Waver looked at his watch.

"You've got forty minutes to get your gear together and be down at the garage, you'll be briefed on the flight over to France." Waver responded, Harry nodded and hugged Freya who still looked calculating. The six year old relaxed into the hug before smiling up at her surrogate older brother.

"You owe me two presents for this." She said quietly, there was no fire in her voice, no demand, just something that told Harry that he should come back, preferably unhurt.

"You got it princess." Harry told the small blond before looking up at his Weapon Smith, Nadia just nodded.

"I'll bring the ammo to your room, you get everything ready." She told him standing and walking out, not giving anyone else in the room so much as a nod of acknowledgement. That was another thing he liked about his Mystic Code Crafter/Weapon Smith, she was fine with transporting his ammo rather than making him pick it up from her office. This was about fifteen minutes away by car.

Harry let the small blond girl go and stretched, before nodding at Waver who nodded back and walked forward to collect up the dishes, thankfully the man wouldn't make him wash those when he needed to check his equipment to avoid dying. Unlike almost every other Lord, or Lady for that matter, inside the Tower. Harry turned to walk away but was stopped by a small hand tugging on his pants, he looked down, Freya pulled out a small package from her shirt pocket and handed it to him.

"It's a present I brought you in France when I had some spare time, I hope you like it." She told him softly, her voice and eyes still belonged to someone much older. Harry opened up the small brown paper wrapped gift, and hugged the little girl again when he saw what it contained. A small Lapis Lazuli crystal cut into the shape of a pyramid on a black leather necklace. The Enforcer in training undid the clasp at the end of the necklace and placed it around his neck the gem settled coldly against his chest.

'Trace on,' his aria was not spoken, merely thought, and a quick round of Reinforcement was applied to the necklace and gem, both of which might have been made from solid steel after he had finished.

"Thanks Princess," Harry told his surrogate little sister as he ruffled her hair affectionately. Freya regained her mischievous grin and smiled up at him. Her eyes back to that of a six year old again.

"Of course you're thankful," She told him proudly. "You got a gift from me what's not to be proud and thankful about?" She asked him, her voice containing all of the force and charisma of Princess upon her throne. Harry just had a quiet smile come to his face in return.

**XXX**

The flight was short, that was all that could really be said for it. Harry had spent the entire hour and a half that they were in the air checking and rechecking his equipment. One may wonder why the Enforcers were being flown over rather than simply using a Translocation array, the answer was actually quite simple. At the time that they left it was six thirty pm, they wouldn't be assaulting the town that the dead apostle was holed up in, a small town out in the French country side if Harry remember correctly, until dawn the next morning. The tower saw no need to waste a Translocation crystal for something that didn't need it.

Harry looked up at the others in the group as they disembarked the plane, nine others including Bazett. Harry didn't know any of the others, he didn't want to know them either. Most Enforcers were not nice people, some even took pleasure in the suffering of others and in killing them. Harry, from the very beginning, was under no illusions, the Enforcers were in no way a nice organisation only the most ruthless and skilled were recruited. It was rare to find someone with a working moral compass like Bazett or he. Harry would trust them to watch his back for this fight and nothing more, trusting a fellow Magi that you never met before with more than that despite the situation was asking to be killed.

It was after disembarking the plane that Harry and the other nine found themselves inside the French Ministry of Magic. They were already approved for entry to the country but some formalities did have to be observed, such as a check in for visitors as well as a brief over view of the situation. That was being given to the team leader who was currently inside the office of the head of the French version of the DMLE(Department of Magical Law Enforcement). The team leader, Hugh Bearce, Harry had only heard of the man before, supposedly he was very good at his job. So there he sat outside in the waiting room along with the other eight while their leader got another update on the situation and would receive another when they got to the base camp outside of the town.

Two teams had come in before them. The first team to set up a forward base of operations and keep the town isolated. No one in, no one out. The second team was to set up the contingency plan, in the event that the strike team that consisted of Harry, Bazett and the other eight failed. The contingency plan was quite simple, if they failed the entire town would be destroyed along with everyone inside, or if they couldn't kill the Apostle by sundown tomorrow the town would also be destroyed, to Harry it was the lesser of two evils really. If the Apostle escaped it could quite well be the end of more than just one town after all.

The black haired Enforcer in training sighed and looked at the door his supposed team leader was behind getting his update on the situation, dear God this was boring. Harry looked up as Bazett took a seat beside him, the purple, well Harry supposed it was more violet really, haired woman looked at him and gave Harry a small smile.

"Worried?" She asked in a kind tone, Harry nodded. He had seen firsthand what a Dead Apostle could do, he had trained to hunt them, to kill them and the more common Vampires when he had to. But even all that training didn't, couldn't, take away the primal fear that he felt when Harry thought about actually having to fight against a monster like a Dead Apostle, it was all he could do to stop his hands from shaking from fear. Harry didn't fear much, he had seen too much as a child before Lorelei took him away to feel fear at much, but a Dead Apostle? Even for all his training, now that he was here and about to be part of an attack on one, his blood felt like it was frozen inside his veins.

Bazett just smiled and reached inside the jacket of her suit and pulled out a small silver lighter. One of the older model flip top ones, an engraving on the side in Latin. E_xire, et exprobrandum tua fata_, Go out and defy your fate, that was the engraving on the side of the lighter. Bazett ran her finger over the inscription fondly, Harry noted that the lighter did have a few scratches on it and did look a bit worn.

"An old friend gave me this before my first job, he told me that he got it from someone else and they got it from someone before that." The violet haired Enforcer told her black haired counterpart lowly. She pressed the lighter into Harry's hands, "I already know you could tell what the inscription meant so I don't need to tell you that. Think of it as a good luck charm." Bazett told him, Harry opened his mouth to refuse the gift, it obviously meant a lot to the older woman, the violet haired Enforcer placed a single finger on his lips and shook her head before standing up and walking over to the other side of the room, Harry just looked at the lighter.

**XXX**

The black haired Enforcer in training groaned as he woke up, was it really three am already? Harry looked over at the still beeping clock and slammed his hand down onto it, yes apparently it was. The black haired child forced himself up and began to pull on his clothing. Thick black pants made of Kevlar fibers and reinforced with both Magecraft and Runes. Black combat boots, a grey long sleeved shirt and finally a black flak jacket and pair of fingerless gloves. Next came the weapons, Harry strapped his two Sig Sauer p226's on each hip, the ammo going straight into the holders on his flak jacket. Along with a couple of packages of C4 and four incendiary grenades, Harry didn't even want to imagine exactly how Nadia had gotten her hands on those. He suspected, rightly, that a military base somewhere was missing some supplies and a few people inside it had some altered memories, it would explain where she got all her ammo, not to mention the guns she just happened to have lying around, at any rate.

On his upper right thigh Harry placed a pouch containing some pre drawn and charged healing runes. Only five of them though, they were difficult to make at the best of times and they did take some time to work as well so it wasn't like they could heal him on the fly. No if he used one Harry would have to find a place to sit still for a few minutes while the runes did their work. If they could heal someone instantly every Enforcer would use them at every opportunity, unfortunately nothing that good existed, at least not yet. Harry quickly, with well-practiced hands, slid several throwing knives into sheaths along his gun belt before strapping Uriel and Belphegor to his back and sighing before walking out of his tent to get some breakfast.

Fifteen minutes later found him chewing on a ration bar and stowing another two inside his thigh pouch. The forward camp was a small affair, only big enough for the twenty people it needed to contain, the remaining team was already off site getting the contingency plan ready if they needed it. Harry sighed and looked up at the pre-dawn gloom. They had divided the small town up into blocks last night there were a few dozen of them and they all needed to be searched. A big job for just ten people fortunately Enforcers were not normal people. The Enforcer checked his equipment for sharpness again, Harry knew it was something of a nervous tick of his but he let it go, every one needed an outlet for things like that.

Harry was still checking the sharpness of his weapons and looking at the sky twenty minutes later when Bazett tapped him on the shoulder. Harry looked up and saw the violet haired woman smiling down at him.

"Feeling any better?" Bazett asked with a slight tone of teasing in her voice that forced Harry to smile.

"Much, guess I just needed my beauty sleep to feel better." Harry made a show of running his hand through his hair. "After all it's not easy to look this sexy, you need at least a few hours of sleep for that." He told her in a superior tone before both Enforcer's broke down in laughter.

"Still got the lighter?" Bazett asked, Harry nodded and tapped the front of his flack jacket.

"It's in an inside pocket." He assured her, the Irish woman nodded in return before taking a bite out of a ration bar. Harry looked at the sky again before his eyes swiveled over to a clock on the wall of the mess tent. Five am, it would take them thirty minutes to get to the town and then the dawn attack was at five forty or there about. Harry stood and flicked his head at the clock the violet haired Enforcer nodded and the two began to walk towards the Jeeps that were parked just inside the camp.

"Showtime"

**XXX**

The castle was a large affair, soaring towers and great ramparts. A medieval gate it's only entrance, this place was secret, such a secret in fact that no one bar one person even knew of its existence. Inside the tallest tower in the very top room sat what could only be described as an old man, his hands inside white silken gloves, a chess board in front of him.

No, not a chess board, it would be insulting to call such a grand master piece a chess board. It was over four meters long and five meters wide, but the black and white squares were arranged as normal, each square exactly five centimeters by five centimeters, there were thousands of them inside the chess board. The board itself contained a multitude of pieces, ranging from ordinary chess pieces to Shogi and Go pieces.

The man picked up a bishop, one of many on the board and moved it slightly before smiling to himself, his strange red eyes glinting in the darkness. The old man stroked his white beard and sighed, he looked to the room around him, filled with books and knowledge of the science of Taumaturgy. The old man looked to the chess board again before picking up a small kaleidoscope and looking through it admiring all the different colours and then returning his attention to the board.

Zelretch smiled at his move before looking over at the empty seat in front of him and smiling, a single statue stood at the center of the board, a statue of one Harry James Potter, not that the boy knew his name yet.

Zelretch's tongue licked his lips in anticipation, gliding over the sharp fangs in his mouth.

"Your move," the ancient Dead Apostle Ancestor stated to the opponent who was not there before looking back at the chess board again. "What will you do now, Knight of Betrayal?"

**Sword Dancer: Mystic Eyes Chapter Two- End**


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